A reader has a dismal reaction to the G7’s late move on the crisis:
I don’t read that with nearly the optimism that many commenters seem to have. It sounds more like hot air (no pun intended). Even if they were concrete goals which would be met in 2100, it’s probably way the hell too late. The only hope is in your final remark about it’s not so much about government as it is about the (small chance of a) tidal wave of public sentiment change and action. But I never over-estimate the public. As such, I’ve been busily mentally drafting a letter to my son, for when he’s a mature adult and I’m dead, apologizing profusely and long for bringing him into a world his parents, grandparents and great-grandparents generations so royally screwed up.
My hope centers around physical manifestations of the problems with fossil fuel overuse. It’s one thing to point at subtle temperature changes and proclaim disaster in the offing, it’s quite another when food prices soar because of crop dislocations caused by out of normal range temperatures, etc. Then the question will become whether we can change fast enough. Once enough people abandon or show they’re willing to abandon fossil fuels, then the infrastructure will be abandoned and the hold outs won’t have a choice – economics at work, you might say.
The Australian experience may be illustrative of this process, at least politically speaking. Whether it’ll work here and in China – two radically different political situations – remains to be seen.
